The Problem With Men, Michelle Obama Says, Is We've Made Them 'Entitled'

On Wednesday former First Lady Michelle Obama took to the stage at the inaugural Obama Foundatiom Summit alongside poet Elizabeth Alexander for a wide-ranging discussion on topics like Twitter, raising children, and the crucial importance of self-care. But perhaps her most pointed and valuable advice was for men in America and their grave need to get a better group of friends.

“Y’all need to get you some friends,” Obama said to uproarious laughter and applause from the crowd.

Female friends, Obama said, "straighten each other out on some things.... Y’all need to go talk to each other about your stuff because there’s so much of it. It’s so messy. Talk about why y’all the way you are."

From there, Obama explained that all the issues that come with male adulthood stem from the way society raises its boys.

"The problem in the world today is we love our boys and we raise our girls. We raise them to be strong and sometimes we take care not to hurt men. And I think we pay for that a little bit," she said. "And that’s a 'we' thing because we’re raising them."

Obama then posed the question asking whether or not we are coddling young men too much "so they feel entitled and a little self-righteous sometimes?" And she added, "But that’s kind of on us too as women and mothers as we nurture men and we push girls to be perfect."

As a mother of two young women, Obama explained that she is focusing on ensuring her daughters are "sturdy and able to exist" in this world, because "it is a world that is dangerous for women."

In addition to her highly useful advice about raising strong girls, Obama also gave a quick lesson to a few unnamed world leaders on how to effectively use social media for god.

"When you have a voice, you can't just use it any kind of way.... You don't just say what's on your mind. You don't tweet every thought," Obama said, again eliciting a huge laugh from the crowd. "Your first initial thoughts are not worthy of the light of day," she added. But to ensure the audience that she wasn't talking about Tweeter-in-Chief Donald Trump Obama coyly added, "And I'm not talking about anybody in particular—I'm talking about us all because everybody does that."

And we'd be apt to believe she wasn't calling out Trump until she threw out this fairly obvious shade, saying that when sending tweets, "You need to think and spell it right, and have good grammar too."